Oh Captain, My Captain
by aquaesulis76
Summary: [TORCHWOOD] Obligatory End of Days fic, what were the team thinking and feeling while Jack was in the morgue? Angst warning.
1. Tosh

"Oh Captain, My Captain." 

Title from the poem of same name by Walt Whitman.

Disclaimer: Torchwood isn't mine, Walt Whitman's poem isn't mine. The angst is.

1 - Tosh:

She didn't, couldn't, understand Gwen's blind, irrational hope; but was envious of it anyway. It was incomprehensible, impossible that Jack, always so full of life and energy, had been transformed into just another body in the morgue.

She'd mourned collegues before, Suzie's death (or both of them) was still a painful memory, but never before with this kind of bewilderment and emptiness. She supposed that feeling was all wrapped up in the enigma that was Jack himself. There were still so many questions she had for him, and about him, so many parts of his personality still to discover and unlock. Jack died just as he had lived, a mystery enveloped in a roguish grin and sly wink.

Their trip back to 1941 had shown her just how much of Jack lay beneath the surface he showed them. Not just his knowledge of the time period, or the amazing (but somehow not surprising) revelation that he used to be a conman - that little gem she hadn't had time to process properly. No, what had hit her forcibly during that night, was Jack's perception, his empathy. She'd seen snatches of it before of course. With Ianto after Lisa, with John Ellis after.. everything, with herself after Mary. There though, in the middle of a war, he had met the man whose name he had taken. He had shown her the kind of man the real Jack Harkness had been: kind, resolute, devoted and loyal to the men under his command.

Her Jack's grief at not being able to save the Captain from a fiery death had been real and raw.

Standing there, looking down at a too pale, too quiet, too still, Jack, she just wished that she had told him that he was everything the other Jack Harkness had been, and more.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

I don't like begging for reviews, but they do make a lovely surprise.


	2. Gwen

Chapter 2 - Gwen 

She sat there, waiting for Jack to wake up. However long it took, she'd wait. She'd be there when he opened his eyes. She didn't know what he'd gone through fighting Abaddon, but she knew it was worse than a mere bullet to the brain. He'd need a friend when he woke, so she watched.

Tosh always took over from her when the boys would finally drag her out of 'Jack's room' and send her home to Rhys with strict instructions to eat and sleep, though she did little of either.

Ianto would normally be sitting, watching Jack when she returned in the early morning. Once it was Owen. He didn't say anything when she entered, simply folding his paper and retreating.

She would sit next to the too still, too quiet Jack, making sure he was comfortable. Fingering that lock of hair that always fell across his forehead. Over and over, playing in her mind, were memories of Jack. The first time she saw him, striding in the rain, leading his team. The invitation of join Torchwood, his patience with her during those first few bewildering weeks. How he handled the mix of personalities in his care. How he tried to show her the importance of her relationship with Rhys.

Jack had loved and lost, she knew. The right kind of Doctor? Well, maybe he'd tell her one day. She wondered why she'd been privy to some of the secrets he kept. The secrets the others were obviously dying to know. Was it because she was the new girl? Had she proven herself to Jack somehow? Or did she just remind him of someone special in that mysterious past he concealed so well?

Whichever, it didn't matter. Jack had put faith and trust in her. She had faith in Jack in return. It wasn't that she'd seen him recover from death wounds before, it wasn't that he'd told her he couldn't die - or at least stay dead. It had been his tone of voice when he told her. Not boasting or bragging. Not playing. Matter of fact, puzzled and wistful. Truthful.

Yes, she had faith in Jack, and so she waited.

oo0oo0oo0oo0oo

I can't ask for reviews cos I've got laryngitis.


	3. Ianto

Chapter 3: Ianto 

He watched Myfanwy slowly swoop down and cross to her favourite perch. Even she seemed to sense the loss that pervaded the entire Hub. The Weevils were quiet in the cells, though that might be fear from the rift nearly opening. Everywhere else, the lack of Jack's presence, that dynamic energy, was palpable. The whole place was too quiet, too still.

Tosh would enter, and settle down to her usual monitering, as well as making sure all the work on her laptop was copied to the main computers. Owen would come in and sort out the reports Tosh passed to him, though he still wasn't using Jack's desk

They all still called it Jack's desk.

Gwen would arrive, take her coffee, then sit with Jack, for hours. She'd barely notice his existance as he brought her coffee and food which she left to grow cold. At six, Owen would say it was time, and together they would pack her up and send her home.

Gwen had claimed Jack during the day, but at night, Jack was his.

He would bring one of the campbeds into the morgue, and curl up there, updating Jack on the events of the day around Cardiff, Wales, the UK, the world. He talked about his childhood, his family, his life. He talked about Torchwood One and the Battle of Canary Wharf. He talked about Lisa. For the silent, unobtrusive member of the team, he talked a lot.

It made no difference that Jack didn't answer, would never again answer, these were things he needed to tell Jack. He know of the intelligence which lay - had lain - behind the mad stories and blatant innuendos. A depth of knowledge about people, about aliens, about life and living, that was boundless. Jack always seemed - had always seemed - almost omnipresient, until you looked into his eyes and realised that his knowledge came from time and experience.

Tosh was claiming that Jack was a time traveller from 1941, but he supposed now they would never know the truth behind Jack's past, know his real name, or what he had done. At the end of it all though, that didn't matter. What he did know, was that without Jack; The Hub, their lives, his life, was empty and cold.

Jack Harkness was Torchwood Three - Cardiff, and now they were all lost.

ooo000ooo000ooo

Reviews are nice!


	4. Owen

Here's the next part, 4/5 

4 - Owen

He'd never thought of this when he decided to study medicine. It had never crossed his mind at uni, and through most of his training. The concept had fleetingly occured to him during his time working in A&E, seeing all around him how suddenly random lives could change in the flicker of an eye, but he'd never seriously entertained the idea. Working at Torchwood though, then the reality had hit hard and fast.

How many colleagues had he checked now? Vital signs - gone, pupils fixed and dilated, skin cooling as body stiffened. Only one diagnosis to make. He'd never get used to it, never could, losing one of their own.

Sitting here, having avoided Ianto, for the first time he could suddenly understand why people wanted to talk to dead bodies. Someone who would let you say what you wanted without judging, never offering back daft advice and never revealing what you confided. He didn't think the others would understand how he felt, he didn't understand himself how he felt. He had shot Jack, had felt all that rage and frustration building in him for longer than he knew, come to the fore. All the things in his life which had failed him, from Diane leaving on down, added to the mystery, evasions and need-to-know secrecy he got from Jack, had all culminated in a finger pulling a trigger.

He remembered Jack teaching him to shoot.

He didn't hate Jack, had never hated Jack. Family: he'd made a family here. And of all the members of that family, Jack was the stand out figure. The big brother he'd never had, the rock, the centre. Reliable, solid, charasmatic, industructable. So now, to see him lying there, too pale, too cold, too quiet, too still... was...

'Losing' they called it, as if you'd put them down somewhere and temporarily forgotten where. This wasn't losing, this was having your life wrenched apart - again. It was all too much. He needed an emotionectomy to eliviate the symptoms of gut-twisting, heart-punching, head-spinning pain that the abscence of one broad-shouldered, period-dressing, flirt caused. He wanted the detachment back, the necessary sign of a doctor, caring enough to heal, but not to feel. He'd lost that alright, lost it the moment he had the gun in his hand and pointing at Jack.

Now he had what he thought he had wanted, responsibility, control, trust. Command of Torchwood Three, and keys to the safe. The paperwork, the phonecalls, the ultimate decision. Now he knew what he really wanted, and he'd give everything up to feel Jack's hand on his shoulder and see that wry grin.

Owen forced back the tears threatening to...

...and stared blindly at his paper until he heard voices outside, and he could let Gwen take his seat.

ooo000ooo000ooo000ooo

cough, cough, reviews, cough, cough


	5. Jack

AN: Here's the final chapter in this little series. There is a 'sequel' though, as the characters wanted more angst, and others wanted to see the reactions to Jack waking up. That'll be along soon. In the meantime, hope you enjoy this one.

5 - Jack

Pain.

Just pain.

Indescribable pain.

The pain of energy being forced out of a body, leaving an overwhelming hollow, deep inside.

Pain.

All his organs being crushed together to make way for more energy to pour out, his blood burning in his veins.

Pain.

Then... black.

Peace and quiet.

Nothing.

So, dead again.

A vague portion of his slowly malfunctioning mind informed him of his status. That unique weightless floating feeling confirmed it.

He let go, and drifted along in the darkness.

A sudden, strange sensation woke his mind and memories. Soft lips on his, the warmth of breath on his skin, pricking his nerve endings.

His heart gave a familiar leap, restarting itself. Blood resumed flowing round his circulation system, filling out all the narrowed, drained arteries. Collasped lungs strained for air.

His eyelids, so slowly, raised as the heavy weight on them was lifted, and he parted his lips to draw in that first, sweet breath. He breathed out again almost reluctantly, but necessarily, shaping it into words.

"Thank you."

Sluggish brain heard and noted the footsteps falter, then turn.

He was back, alive again, and maybe - just maybe - this time he would wake to see the grinning face of the right kind of Doctor.

The End

ooo000ooo000

Thanks to everyone who read & especially those who reviewed.

Jan 07


End file.
